This week the class has continued our interest in robots. Some children chose to draw robots yesterday, and some began exploring the robot-making materials in the studio today. (We're not quite ready to glue and tape the pieces together yet.) Below are some pictures of the exploration from today. Click on the pictures to see more information.
If you built a robot- what materials would you need? What would your robot do? We've been discussing what robots can do quite a bit in class. Ask your child what his or her robot would do. While reading a book about ways to re-use old items yesterday, we found a picture of a robot. The students have been quite excited about the idea of building robots in the classroom. Today, a small group of children helped make a list of "robot-building materials" we would need. These included:
These students then went into our closet and gather the materials pictured above. Tomorrow, we're going to show these to the whole class and ask our friends to start drawing pictures of robots to build. There's discussion of building one BIG robot as a class, as well as several smaller robots. We're excited to see where the robot project takes us! (Be on the look-out for a list of materials they want to ask parents for- including a large box or two!) We're excited about some of the new materials in the block area- ramps, balls, tubes, and a few un-named accessories to go with these! We're exploring what different types of materials work best to travel down the ramps (so far balls are better than cars), how long the ramps can go (across the room!), and what changes when the ramps get steeper. Objectives We're Meeting: 21a: Explores spatial relationships 22: Compares and measures 24: Uses scientific inquiry skills 26. Demonstrates knowledge of the physical properties of objects and materials As we continue to learn about resources in ECE, we were lucky enough to have Mr. Jaquette join us once again.
Today, he came to help us learn about sorting materials into trash, recycling, and compost. This week we will be creating new signs for our trash cans, recycling bin, and compost bin to help us remember what goes where. Ask your child if they can tell you some items that go in each of these! (Compost, Recycling, Trash) Your child is going to start bringing home a sheet like the one pictured above a few times a week (the other days we will keep them). These are called Play Plans.
On this form, each child draws a picture of what they plan on doing during choice time. The picture should be of them in the center working. At the bottom, we help each child write their plan. Our plans all being with "I am going to..." What are the lines under each word for? These help the child hear and identify each word separately, and will help us later in the year when some children will start writing the plan themselves. How can we use them at home? These are a great starting point in a conversation about the day- even if it's a day they don't come home. You can ask your child what their play plan said before choice time. I've added this to the Useful Links list as well, but here is a good starting point for Brain Builders at home from an organization called Vroom.
They are listed in age groups from 0-5. http://joinvroom.org/sites/default/files/Vroom_Activities_English_0.pdf The students returned today to quite a few new materials, new centers, and new academic opportunities. We'll be featuring these (and standards they help to meet) over the next few weeks. Magnetic Letters- often found on refrigerators, are a new popular material in the room. We found some of the children were experimenting with letter strings, while others were excited to spell their names. Magnetic letters are a great resource to practice 'writing' without getting caught up in letter formation (and important but separate skill). Objectives We're Meeting: 15: Demonstrates phonological awareness, notices and discriminates smaller and smaller units of sound 16a: Identifies and names letters 16b: Uses letter-sound knowledge 17b: Uses print concepts 16b: Writes to convey meaning These don't include when the children create patterns with the letters, or count how many letters they have lined up, match one another, etc. If you have magnetic letters at home, how does your child interact with them? How do you help them?
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